The increasing speed and ease of direct access to the information needed for decision-making, is drastically reducing the number of middle managers who used to be hired to provide them.

In companies of the last century when a sales manager needed information about last year's sales in order to take a relevant decision, he or she had to contact their assistant manager, who was responsible for collecting information and presenting it to the director. Nowadays, the direct and easy access to all information concerning day-to-day business allows the same director to touch a screen, get the information and make the decision, reducing costs and saving time.

Companies recognize how important managing a growing international and mobile workforce is for the future of their businesses, but they do not know how to do it.

Companies do not have an appropriate strategy to deal with the transformation that is happening the way of working in the world -from the convergence of five generations to operations spread across the planet- which will lead to a crisis in management, attraction and retention of talent, concludes the Workforce 2020 study, prepared by Oxford Economics and SAP.

In order to solve problems entrepreneurs are seeking new ways of behaving, while most managers use logical thinking, directly related to established processes.

An article in Nacion.com reports that "... A research team of neuroscientists and academics from business schools in Italy and Switzerland have used an fMRI to capture images of the brains of entrepreneurs and managers who performed a task consisting in the search for alternative approaches to solve a problem, something scholars call 'exploration'. "

A professional degree used to be a guarantee of social mobility and prestige, but the current labour market pays little for some of them.

The labor market can be compared to the commercial market. Salaries are defined by the evolution of supply and demand. When supply is greater than demand, salaries are lowered and when demand is greater than supply, wages rise.

It is becoming increasingly difficult to get staff trained to work as freight brokers, which is causing delays in the commercial movements.

According to Daniel Isaza, president of the Logistics Business Council, this causes businesses to become slower. "If we dont have qualified people who speak English, for example, it limits us a little in business, because it makes communication slower," he said.

Panamanians are not interested in technical careers but rather social ones, as reflected by the short supply of professionals to meet the needs of the industry.

This issue was discussed during the forum 'maritime sector and the impact of human resources in its development ", organized by the International Maritime University of Panama (UMIP by its initials in Spanish). According to the Director of Planning of the UMIP, Fernanda Billard, opportunities exist for technical training and supplying the workforce, but these have not been taken up by Panamanians.

Engineers in different specialties, sales representatives and administrative assistants, who are all fluent in English, are those most in demand.

The Talent Shortage Survey, conducted by ManpowerGroup Costa Rica among 620 employers, found that in the case of university courses "engineering (with their different emphases) is the only one that stands out in the list of jobs in demand this year ... ", reported Nacion.com.

Rigid working structures remains an obstacle to be overcome by women, even though new technologies have made working conditions more flexible in the world.

According to Sonia Vanegas, country manager of Manpower, at a global level, for several years many companies have started to promote policies that are friendly to women's performance. "Many women still fail to establish the balance between personal and professional life due to, among other things, rigid schedules that keep them stuck in the office," says Vanegas.

O4Bi is a system that allows to control and manage what a company needs: the complete process of development of works, accounts receivable, treasury, banks, sales and accounting.
O4Bi is a very robust system that allows to control and...

O4Bi is a system that allows to control and manage what a company needs: the complete process of development of works, accounts receivable, treasury, banks, sales and accounting.
O4Bi is a very robust system that allows to control and...